Historic Treaty Makes Nuclear Weapons Illegal

Remember this day, July 7, 2017. Today, history was made at the United Nations and the nuclear status quo was put on notice and most of the world stood up and said simply, “Enough.”

(Source: United Nations)

Just hours ago, 122 nations and a dedicated group of global campaigners successfully adopted a legally binding international treaty prohibiting nuclear weapons and making it illegal “to develop, test, produce, manufacture, otherwise acquire, possess or stockpile nuclear weapons or other nuclear explosive devices.” Nuclear weapons now join biological and chemical weapons, land mines and cluster munitions that are now explicitly and completely banned under international law.

Our heartfelt gratitude to all who worked tirelessly to make this moment possible, including the International Campaign to Abolish Nuclear Weapons (ICAN), Reaching Critical Will, the governments of Norway, Mexico and Austria (which hosted three international conferences on the Humanitarian Consequences of Nuclear Weapons which inspired this effort) and so many other nations, civil society organizations, scientists, doctors & other public health professionals and global citizens/activists.

This is a powerful expression of conscience and principle on behalf of humanity from 63 percent of the 193 UN member states—one anchored in the simple truth that nuclear weapons are illegitimate instruments of security. ICAN lays out the imperative quite well:

“Nuclear weapons are the most destructive, inhumane and indiscriminate weapons ever created. Both in the scale of the devastation they cause, and in their uniquely persistent, spreading, genetically damaging radioactive fallout, they are unlike any other weapons. They are a threat to human survival.”

Challenging the status quo is at the heart of most successful mass movements for social and planetary progress. Those who benefit from the status quo never give up easily. Movements to end slavery, give women the right to vote, establish marriage equality in the United States and other examples of momentous social change were first bitterly opposed and derided by opponents as naïve, wrong, out of touch, costly, unachievable, etc.

Nuclear weapons are no different. The United States, Russia and other nuclear-armed and nuclear “umbrella” states chose not to participate in these ban treaty negotiations, and dismissed it outright. Indeed, senior officials in the Obama administration spent years doing verbal gymnastics to align the rhetoric of the president who stood up in Prague pledging to work toward “the peace and security of a world free of nuclear weapons” with outright hostility to the ban treaty. To no one’s surprise, the Trump administration has embraced the Obama administration’s plans to perpetuate the nuclear status quo and has forfeited any role or leadership in this critical discussion.

And don’t even get me started about all of the Washington insiders who believe nuclear deterrence will never fail and we can rely on the sound judgement of a small number of people (most of them men) to prevent global nuclear catastrophe.

The ban treaty effort is meant to provide renewed energy and momentum to the moribund global nuclear disarmament process. It is intended to be a prod to the nuclear-armed signatories of the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT), which have largely ignored their obligation to pursue nuclear disarmament. It will help revive the NPT and the UN’s Conference on Disarmament, not replace them.

Indeed, most of the world has run out of patience and today they spoke loudly. The treaty will be open for signature in September and one can only hope that this is a true turning point in our effort to save humanity from these most horrible of all weapons.